In Love and War

When her parents were killed in a dreadful coaching accident leaving Louise, at nineteen, suddenly and devastatingly alone in the world, it was to her neighbour, Richard Oakingham, she turned. He supported her through the ordeal, stood beside her at the grave, offered her his love and protection and, after the funeral, when she was at her most vulnerable, asked her to marry him. She did not realise he was an inveterate gambler until it was too late.
Before a year was out, she had endured the loss of her own money, the pawning of her jewels, the move from house to apartment, from apartment to furnished room. one room, then another, each smaller and more sordid than the last. She endured because there had been no choice; she could not go back, there was nowhere to go back to, and besides, she still loved him. She was appalled when she discovered he was prepared to gamble with her life and she had been won in a game of cards by Captain Paul Fourier, home on leave from the Peninsular War.
She found herself with Paul in Portugal, following the army as it went to war. And here she learned why so many women followed their men into battle and here she discovered the true meaning of love.